FAMOUS AUTHORS: TOM CLANCY, RAY BRADBURY, MICKEY SPILLANE and JOHN UPDIKE
1968 first day cover for the 6¢ FDR coil stamp, signed by famous authors Tom Clancy, Ray Bradbury, Mickey Spillane and John Updike.
First day cover signed: "Tom Clancy", "Mickey Spillane", "John Updike" and Ray Bradbury", 6½x3½. First day cover for the 6¢ Franklin D. Roosevelt vertical coil stamp with b/w cachet of Roosevelt addressing the 73rd Congress at left edge. Postmarked Washington, D. C., 1968 February 28. One 6¢ brown-and-yellow Roosevelt stamp affixed. FIRST DAY OF ISSUE. A pioneer of the techno-thriller, insurance broker TOM CLANCY (1947-2013) combined his lifelong interests in the military and technology in his first novel, The Hunt For Red October (1984). The book, which became an instant best-seller, introduced Ryan, who became a government operative in later novels, including Patriot Games (1997) and Clear and Present Danger (1989). All three books were made into films. He also created the media franchise Rainbow Six and contributed to the Splinter Cell video game series. Ray BRADBURY (1920-2012) is the favorite science fiction writer of many readers who don't normally like SF. Among his classic novels The Martian Chronicles (1950), The Illustrated Man (1951), Fahrenheit 451 (1953) and Something Wicked This Way Comes (1962); all these books became films. His Ray Bradbury Theater ran on TV from 1985 to 1992. The Emmy-winning, Oscar-nominated writer won the Science Fiction Writers Association's Grand Master Award (1988) and the National Book Foundation Medal for Distinguished Contribution to American Letters (2000). MICKEY SPILLANE (1918-2006) introduced his hard-boiled detective hero Mike Hammer in the first of seven Hammer novels, I, the Jury (1947). In a 1967 list of the best-selling novels of 1895 to 1965, seven of the top 29 were novels by Spillane. The versatile author, who has been everything from a flight instructor to a human cannonball, also appeared in films, starring as Mike Hammer in The Girl Hunter (1963). In 1995, the Mystery Writers of America honored him with their Grand Master award. Novelist and short story writer JOHN UPDIKE (1932-2009), whose novels focus on the tensions of middle-class American life, won Pulitzer Prizes in 1982 and 1991 for Rabbit is Rich (1981) and Rabbit at Rest (1990), sequels to his 1960 novel, Rabbit, Run. A longtime contributor to "The New Yorker" and the writer of some 30 novels and short story collections, Updike's other works include The Couples (1968) and The Witches of Eastwick (1984). Lightly toned. Postmark touches Clancy's signature but is legible. Pen skipped while writing Clancy's signature. Clancy and Updike's signatures touch but are legible. Spillane's signature has bled lightly but is legible. Otherwise, fine condition.